I think in almost all respects I agree with RangerWickett here; with the crucial point being separating out "hit points" from wounds. I posted this on a different thread and it encapsulates my thoughts:
Basic Premises
Hit Points
You have hit points that represent everything that hit points are supposed to represent: combat capacity, ability to turn lethal damage, endurance, divine providence, inner strength, luck, faith, the will to go on/motivation and all those other generalities.
Wounds
You have a physical limit for wounds before becoming incapacitated. You have a further limit before dying. Wounds are individually tracked and are rare compared to hit point loss.
Hit Point Loss
Hit points are lost as per usual (and also gained through the various mundane ways that 4e encouraged). Hit points are effectively the capacity to continue in combat.
Gaining Wounds
Wounds are gained if struck with a critical hit or if the character receives hp loss when at 0 hit points; basically when the character is physically or mentally spent. In other words, you are not tracking every single hit; the majority of them are inconsequential hit point loss. A wound is measured in hit points using a scale of 1 hit point represents a wound that takes 1 day to "heal" before it does not affect the character. [A single 7 hp wound would take 7 days to "heal"/not affect the character].
Incapacitated or Dying Limits
If the total number of wounds equals or exceeds a certain number the character is incapacitated; if it equals or exceeds a further limit, the character is dying (in that revivication way Monte was recently talking about). For example a character with limits 10|18 would be incapacitated if taking more than 10hps worth of wounds or be dying if taking 18 points or more. A dying character may be in that dying state for a lengthy period of time before they are actually dead.
Hit Point Restoration
Hit points are easily restored through either rest or possibly within combat. A monk may use their inner strength to restore hps in combat or a priest their faith may bless their allies with divine protection. A fighter may kill the enemy leader motivating their allies (and boosting their hps) or a warlord or paladin may motivate their allies through other means. A rogue may be able to elicit unusual luck in a particular circumstance to gift themselves with a hp boost. The design space for the restoration of hit points is dramatically increased by separating all the things hit points represent from actual physical wounding damage.
Healing Wounds
Wounds on the other hand are healed much more slowly but there should always be effective mundane/non-magical means to deal with wounds. Each wound is healed 1hp per day, however there might be a limit based upon constitution/racial factors as to how many may be healed. For example, a character may have the capacity for 3 wounds a day to be healed. They may have wounds of 2, 2, 3 and 7. However, you heal in order of lowest to highest so only the 2, 2 and 3hp wounds are healed (the 7hp wound stays on 7hp) leaving the character with wounds of 1, 1, 2 and 7. Thus a high hit point wound may not heal as easily as lesser ones.
The typical method of healing wounds should be non-magical using skill in healing. Magical rituals however may provide a more dramatic but costly method of healing wounds. As an option, you can have varying types of wounds that encompass the full range of trauma and the specific effects that go with them: critical hit table etc.
Hit Point and Wound Capacity Growth
As a character gains levels, their hps expand as usual but their capacity for wounds only increases in minor ways. For example, you might have a monk and a wizard of near equal "bulk" and thus their dying limit would be likewise similar: maybe 20 hit points worth of wounds. However, the monk is trained to deal with pain so their incapacitated limit is much closer to this limit than the wizards; maybe 18 hps worth of wounds versus the wizard's 4hps. One whack with a knife and the slipper wearing wizard is incapacitated as they look in horror at their own blood where as the monk or barbarian would ignore such things as "merely a flesh wound". With training, both limits increase very slowly but the incapacitated limit would increase at a greater rate than the dying limit to reflect the capacity to handle wounds without falling in a screaming heap.
Benefits
By separating hit point loss from actual physical damage, you immediately cancel out every disparity caused by combining incapacitating physical damage with hit points. You still get the benefit of how hit points are defined and in fact you can extend and expand upon this so that hit points are more easily restored in combat. Book-keeping levels are lowered as you are not tracking every single hit; just the "critical" ones. Essentially, for the sake of tracking 3 or 4 wounds, you get a whole heap of "benefits". In addition, you can easily incorporate armor as damage reduction (DR) into this model. For some these benefits are significant, for others it is less so but either way, this is the model I would love to play with.
Best Regards
Herremann the Wise
